On ABC’s This Week, columnist George F. Will and Paul Wolfowitz, the former deputy Secretary of Defense, sparred on whether U.S. forces should intervene in Libya.
“It is not worth war,” Will argued. “We have intervened in a tribal society in a civil war. And we have taken sides in that civil war on behalf of people we do not know or understand, for the purpose — not avowed, but inexorably our purpose — of creating a political vacuum by decapitating the government. Into that vacuum, what will flow we do not know and cannot know.”
Wolfowitz disagreed. “What we have prevented, for one thing, is a bloodbath in Benghazi, which would have stained our reputation throughout the Arab world at a time when our reputation really matters,” he said. “I understand George’s hesitations. But it would seem to me, if you followed those hesitations, you would say, ‘It is better to keep this devil that we know than the unknown.’ And I don’t see how any unknown could be worse than the devil who is in Tripoli right now.”
“We have paid the price of intervention, sometimes we have paid the price of nonintervention, in Bosnia, for example,” Wolfowitz continued. “One of the things that makes this situation so unique is the monstrous quality of the Tripoli regime, the monstrous quality of Qaddafi and his sons. I know people say, ‘What about Bahrain? What about Yemen?’ This is a totally different case, where a man is actually slaughtering his own people, has no regard for his own people, and uses mercenaries to kill them. It is a unique case and it is being watched around the Arab world.”
“There is no limiting principle in what we have done,” Will replied, commenting on the global implications of U.S. policy. “If we are to protect people who are under assault, then where people are under assault in Bahrain, we are not only logically committed to help them, we are inciting them to rise in expectation. The mission creep began, Paul, before the mission began because we had a means not suited to the end. The means is a no-fly zone. That will not effect the end, which is obviously regime change.”
Let's roll the tape for Mr. Wolfowitz, in that case, if he cannot understand how the unknown devil can be worse than than the known devil:
Batista -> Castro; Somoza -> Sandinistas; Shah -> Khomeini; PLO -> Hamas, Hezbollah; and back a bit, Tsar -> Lenin -> Stalin. And then there's Mubarek -> ??? (we might have waited to see how that one turns out).
So, it's not a new game being played here.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI must go farther in my critique of Wolfowitz's remark. He has expressed what may be the most fundamental error in the liberal world view: that which assumes that given any unsatisfactory situation, all alternatives to it are better.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOne basic flaw in Wolfowitz's reasoning of course is that he doesn't even consider the price. We could agree with his point that anything would be better than Qaddafy, and still not agree that the net benefit to us in an "improvement" to a Muslim Brotherhood rule would be positive; not once financial cost, lives and casualties, and the impact of spreading even thinner our already-stretched forces are factored in.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI for one am glad a spirited and concise debate can take place on this topic. It sure beats the typical "talking point" drivel that passes for debate when two congress critters get 90 seconds each in the capitol lobby.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse>"What we have prevented, for one thing, is a bloodbath in Benghazi, which would have stained our reputation throughout the Arab world at a time when our reputation really matters"
Incoherent nonsense. Is Wolfowitz really suggesting that a "bloodbath in Benghazi" would be on OUR hands and not that of the participants? Does he actually imagine that our reputation in the Arab would would be sullied by not getting involved in the civil war in Libya, and that the Arab would will look at us with admiration and gratitude for our intervention?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIn the mind of Will perfection (protect every human under assault) is the only right course of action ...
a perfect example of perfection being the enemy of good ..
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhile I generally agree with everything that Will says with respect to domestic policy, I'm frequently in disagreement with him on foreign policy. He seems to represent the wing of American conservatism that adheres to the "If we won't bother them, they won't bother us" foreign policy standard.
And, even though I'm not a a Wolfiwitz-style neocon, I think he's largely correct here, although I believe he could have framed his argument a bit more artfully.
And, we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that Qaddafi (is that the official NRO spelling?) has ample amounts of American blood on his hands, and (so far) the governments of Yemen and Bahrain don't. That should count for something, should it not?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMartin McPhillips raises a point, but Obama already took sides with the rebels, so he is more of a George Herbert Walker Bush position on this when he encouraged (Shias)* to uprise in Iraq and then allowed Saddam to come in and clean them out.
*the correct word was improperly recognized as something else and flagged as "objectionable language."
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe cakewalk crowd has returned.
When are conservatives finally going to realize the Neocons are menace? There is nothing conservative about them. They are dangerous radicals.
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Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAmerican policy should be, and should have been since December 22, 1988, the destruction of Colonel Gaddaffi. He has ample American, British and other nations' blood on his hands, not only from Pan Am 103. We should have taken out his air fields, defense capabilities and as much of his armor as possible, by ourselves, unannounced, when his diplomats and generals were deserting him in early March, then stepped back to let his Army staff finish the job. Who follows him concerns me not.
If we took the trouble to avenge terrorist attacks promptly, clearly, and overwhelmingly, things like Somali pirates and the numerous attacks on America and American interests perpetrated by radical Islam would just go away. No tyrant wants to sign his own death sentence.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIs there a point at which Wolfowitz, the Kagans, Kristol, Perle, et al; can be wrong so many times that they lose credibility? Why does anyone still listen to them when their track record is so abysmal? Their opinions have been rendered meaningless by the degrees to which they were wrong.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"And I don’t see how any unknown could be worse than the devil who is in Tripoli right now", umm, it could be an Islamo-Fascist terror sponsor?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGreat summary. Will wins the argument. Wolfowiitz was suprisingly weak for a guy who is supposed to be so smart.
Martin accurately flagged perhaps the weakest part of his argument: "And I don’t see how any unknown could be worse than the devil who is in Tripoli right now.”
If that really is a premise for the action, it is absurd. I think the problem is unsolvable by outside forces. I would have personally threatened Quaddafi if he allowed a carnage of civilians and otherwise generally let the Libya tribes battle it out (which is what is going to wind up happening anyway).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseKhadaffy Duck has been a lethal enemy of the U.S. for 40 years. He's now given us the perfect excuse to take him out -- we should take advantage of it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWe have paid the price of intervention?
Isn't this the idiot who said "the war in Iraq won't cost anything - it will pay for itself"?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe Libyan insurgency seemed to me to rise on the contagion of upheaval in the region, some of that encouraged by Obama or not encouraged by Obama depending on the day. He did urge Qaddafi to give up power, perhaps making the Libyan rebels more determined to overthrow the tyrant, but not initiating the rebellion.
This intervention by the U.S. strikes me as more Obama/Hillary Bosom State busybodyism and about as well thought out as ObamaCare. They're adding a third war the way a third massive entitlement program was added to two existing and effectively bankrupt massive entitlement programs.
There's no national security threat from Libya (all the big national security threats are in Washington), so it's portrayed as a humanitarian mission. Did the Libyan rebels think that trying to overthrow Qaddafi was a risk-free endeavor? Whether they did or not, here comes the universal care.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think there are two things most NRO readers can and should agree on:
1. It has been ten years now since "neocon" was corrupted by the Left to mean something completely different than what the word originally meant. So, can we all please stop using this useless word?
2. I don't know whether George Will or Paul Wolfowitz was right this morning, but Christiane Amanpour was, and is always, a complete waste of a chair. One could have run a drinking game off her this morning, "But what about Bahhhhrain and Yemmmmmmmen? WHAAAAA."
Bring back Tapper. Heck, bring back *Steponallofus*. Anyone else but this ignorant, American-hating twit.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Khadaffy Duck has been a lethal enemy of the U.S. for 40 years. He's now given us the perfect excuse to take him out -- we should take advantage of it."
Recently, he has not been a threat to the US or his neighbors. Based on what I read, I don't think he would have been a threat to the US in the future. If he stays in power, he definitely will be a threat now. Unlike the enemies the Left always talks about, Qaddafi has the means and will to carry out attacks against the US. Talk about creating enemies.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse1. I still don't have enough information to form an opinion. Until the government makes such information available (if they have it!), I do not support intervention. The days are long gone when I would defer to the government's judgment about this kind of thing.
2. When pundits hold forth regarding Libya, it would be very helpful to know what--including outcome and cost--they recommended and predicted regarding Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. A great assignment for a National Review intern?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI wish everyone would quit referring to the Libyan people as "his people" in reference to Qaddafi. He doesn't own them, and he has no right to rule them.
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